Kairi
by C.B. Magique
Summary: A one-shot in which Namine and Xion chat about what the world should be and contemplate why it isn't.


My second complete Kingdom Hearts fic which I hope will stay a one-shot this time. It's loosely based on a theory I wrote about in my other fic The Reemergence of One Lost in His Own Heart so if you read that and didn't like it, you may not like this one either. Don't worry, you don't have to read it to understand this and it won't really help (except reading chapter 2 might help a bit because that's when I first introduced Sunni who returns in this story and she is Sora's little sister).

I kind of fancied the idea of Xion being Kairi's 'other' Nobody (see chapter 4 of Reemergence to fully understand this reference) now that i've learned more about 358/2 Days and I wanted to write something about it. I also wanted to analyse a little bit about the relationship between Sora, Riku and Kairi and what it really is because if I'm right in that the trio go back to life the way it was before the whole shmazz, doesn't that actually mean a step backwards in Kairi and Sora's relationship? Well, that's what I thought and I tried to reflect it in this story - although I think I've reflected this way better than I've reflected anything else in this story. Also on my mind while writing this was the relationship Sora and Riku have with Selphie, Tidus and Wakka. After playing KH2 I felt as though those guys were just there to fill up some space. I mean, they were minor characters so that's kind of their purpose but they had such big roles in FF and they have so much character that I think it was a waste to just chuck them in as extras. You might think that they were there because it was carefully considered but in my opinion, no one really considered what these characters were actually doing in such a role. I mean, in Jiminy's journal in KH1 they get mentioned only say that we don't know anything about them. It would be like making a new Disney movie and putting Mickey and Minnie Mouse in as extra characters who stand in the background and do nothing, or maybe get a line or two but otherwise have no highly significant interaction with the main characters. Yes, it would be cute and appealing to the consumerist audience and I suppose it is so true for Selphie, Tidus and Wakka in KH. *sigh*

And right about now I would have been pissing and moaning some more about what I hate about KH and FF because I'm in that mood but I won't because I just spent like half and hour doing that in the author notes of a different KH fic which I haven't completed yet.

Disclaimer: I don't own Kingdom Hearts... do I really have to tell you this?

* * *

_It can be said – in the simplest terms – that when Sora and Kairi are together, Roxas and Naminé are also together._

_It can also be said – in the most retarded of terms – that when Kairi is alone, Xion and Naminé are together. _

The sunset was beautiful that evening. Too bad about the breeze, though. The air was stagnant and it was ridiculously humid, making the beach a horrid place to sit. Kairi just wanted to sit by herself for a while. Sora and Riku were on the main island playing swords like they used to when they were children. Why did she feel so far away? Ever since Riku and Sora had been reunited the bond Kairi was sure she'd been building with Sora was beginning to wane. Their relationship was beginning to glide at first – just short of soaring – but as soon as Riku was back Sora had dragged her back down to the earth and everything returned to normal. Kairi wanted that feeling of flying to continue but being back on the ground after feeling it for the first time gave her the sensation of weighing three times as much as she really did and she was sure that returning to the sky was impossible.

She couldn't see them from where she sat with her bare feet in the waves but in her mind she could see how Sora and Riku were at the moment. They'd be evenly matched for once. Sora would be having fun, Riku would take it seriously and just be glad to be there: in the sunlight with his best friend. Riku would accidentally hurt Sora – hitting him in the arm, or the leg, or in the head a bit hard – and instantly feel apologetic. Then, while Riku was worrying over him, Sora would jump up and foolishly start a wrestling match that he had no hope of winning. He'd be the one who ended up with his chest crushed by Riku's weight, sand in his mouth, hair and in his pants. Then his annoying little sister would try to attack Riku with a vengeance and Riku would laugh at her and trap her under his arm, teasing her about getting his sweaty armpit smell on her. And she'd bite him. The way all three of them carried on, an onlooker at a distance would think they were all five-year-olds.

Kairi was faced with a new fear. What if time was reversed? Now they were back and they were free to behave as children if they wanted to and begin a process of 're-maturity'. They could grow up without her. She couldn't help thinking that all this time she'd been trying to squirm into a family she didn't belong to. She wanted to go back to Radiant Garden. Right now, she wanted to see if she could find the family that she was supposed to belong to.

Of course, Xion and Naminé weren't quite oblivious to this.

"This is who I am?" Xion asked herself. "This is quite depressing."

"It wasn't always like this," Naminé assured her.

"Easy for you to say! You're the one with the memories. I wonder why it turned out this way."

Naminé cocked her head to the side. "What's wrong?"

"How can two people be the same? Aren't we the same? We're both the Nobodies of a girl named Kairi. Why?"

Naminé gave her that knowing smile. That smile always irritated Xion a bit. She was sick of not knowing things. "It's actually really simple. There's one for losing something you own, and one for losing something you borrowed."

"Excuse me?"

Naminé clasped her hands together in front of her and then flexed them. Xion thought it was just a habit the white girl had developed because she had spent so much of her time drawing. "It's complicated… but it can be simple too. For losing her own heart, Kairi's Nobody was created: you. For losing – or should I say, giving up – Sora's heart, she gained another Nobody: me."

"How does a Princess of Heart lose her heart?" Xion said, turning to the sunset. "The Heartless would never be able to take it from her, would they?"

"No, but a higher being definitely can," Naminé said, seeming almost sad.

"What are you saying?"

"Riku… he used his dark powers to protect her heart but the heart was afraid of the dark and ran away from him."

"Where would it go?"

"Back home, of course."

"But you told me that she didn't wake up."

"She couldn't. Her heart was too oppressed by the darkness it accumulated while searching for her again."

"Searching… like I was?"

Naminé smiled again and Xion wanted to slap that smile off her face. However, she composed herself and kept her eyes glued to the horizon.

"You mean… Riku was the one who ripped her heart out?" Xion clarified, trying to get her head around that. Riku wouldn't do that, would he?

"Not on purpose," Naminé answered hastily. "He had the best of intentions for Kairi. I bet he was always thinking about her. He cared a lot for her."

"Sora did too," Xion added. "Did they care for each other as much?"

Naminé shrugged. "Possibly more. And I think they don't want to fight over Kairi ever again."

"You _think_?"

Naminé paused. "I do."

"Well I… I… I _think_ I'm rather angry with you."

"You _think_?"

"Yes, I definitely _think_… therefore I must be… I must be rather angry with you if I think so."

"There should be more Nobodies adopting that philosophy," Naminé joked. "Then we wouldn't have so many inner arguments with ourselves and our identity crises."

Xion closed her eyes for a minute as a cool breeze came down from wherever it was hiding in the sky and cooled the beach before lifting itself back into the heavens. "You know, I wanted to be with the two of them… always."

"You're with one of them," Naminé supplied, trying to be comforting.

Xion glared at her. "And where's the other one? It's all well and good for you; I bet it doesn't matter to you so long as you and Roxas can be together. I have two special people. I decided that I needed to be with both of them if I wanted to exist."

"I see…" Naminé murmured, beginning to understand a bit more. Their unbreakable wish to be together – the three of them – kept them all connected to each other on the outside.

"We should never be able to talk like this," Xion snapped.

"I agree," Naminé replied. "Kairi should always be together with Riku and Sora."

"I still don't understand how a person can have two Nobodies."

"Perhaps it's because a Nobody is just a body and soul. Even Heartless have bodies created of darkness. Nobodies are created of darkness too but with a strong spirit that doesn't want to disappear even with the loss of a heart."

"Aren't we special," Xion muttered.

Naminé beamed. Xion welcomed the change of expression-of-happiness-they-didn't-have and felt comforted by it.

--

Meanwhile, back on the main island, Riku grabbed Tidus in a headlock. The younger blond kicked him in the shin. He cursed and was knocked to the ground unprepared when Wakka tackled him to the ground in support of Tidus. Riku reversed the headlock on Tidus and wrapped an arm around Wakka's head too. The redhead had his face pushed into the sand.

"I think Riku wins," Sora announced from the sidelines. Sunni and Selphie applauded the match they'd just been presented with.

"Even two against one, you guys are no match for him," Selphie giggled.

"Oh yeah, that's real encouraging," Tidus retorted. Selphie just laughed again.

Sora was incredibly uncomfortable with sand in places he'd rather not mention but it had to be worse for Tidus and Wakka who were completely soaked after Blitzball practice. They had sand stuck to their clothes, their faces and the rest of their skin. Selphie helped the two boys up. Tidus tried to wipe sand off his face but he just made the situation worse with the sand on his fingers.

"I think Riku cheated," Sunni said teasingly. Riku glowered at her.

"C'mon, Riku wouldn't do a thing like that," Sora argued. "By the way, where's Kairi?"

"I think she went to the little island," Selphie replied, wiping sand off Wakka and Tidus with her hanky. "She's been so boring lately. She won't hang out with me so the only people I have are these two boneheads."

"Oi!" Tidus and Wakka protested.

"Someone should go get her, ya," Wakka added. "Nice match by the way, brutha."

He and Riku bumped knuckles.

"Sora, it's late," Sunni observed as the sky darkened. "Should we go home?"

"We don't have to go home just yet," Selphie said as a wonderful (in her mind) idea came to her. "Let's hang out in town tonight!"

The others looked at her strangely.

"We don't usually do that," Tidus said nervously.

"I know but there should be a first time for everything, right?" Selphie answered. "Do you guys have any munny? You can't go for a night out without munny."

"Oh yeah!" Sunni cheered. "I got my pocket munny today! Let's eat ramen for dinner!"

"Yeah," Tidus agreed quickly. "Then I wanna check out the new flavour at the ice cream parlour."

"You've had all day to do that," Wakka told him.

"I know, but I was at school! And then I had detention so I had to go straight to Blitzball and I didn't have time to stop and check it out. Wait there guys, I'm gonna go and get Kairi."

Tidus charged off into the sea and rid himself of the irritating sand in the salt water before climbing into a boat and cast off with a course set for the small island.

"What else can we do at night?" Riku asked.

"Oh, we'll think of something as we go," Selphie said, completely unworried. "I mean, that's what we do during the day. Why should it be any different at night?"

"You said it, sista," Wakka grinned, patting her on the head and earning an annoyed sound when Selphie got sand in her hair. "We're friends no matter what time of day."

Sora acquiesced wholeheartedly and showed it with a wide, sunny grin that seemed to light up the beach even though the sun was disappearing fast.

* * *

I admit, I don't like Kairi as a character anymore. She was cool in KH1 but in KH2 her role became a bit ambiguous and her personality contrasted the personality she had in KH1 (I know, I said I was done pissing and moaning but I just have to say this) and yeah, this is kind of redundant because Sora does acknowledge in KH2 that she is a different person. The thing is, I don't want to believe that this is simply because SquEnix got a little ignorant of the plot and I reckon that this represents an actual change in her... which is weird and kind of hypocritical, considering that she asked Sora to never change (well, more like told him). And I thought: 'hey, how come she gets to change her character a little and expect Sora to stay the same?' I mean, they're going into puberty and I know I don't act the same way I did when I was fourteen. What I hope is that in KH3 we see Nomura pick this up as a major theme. I mean, if he's going to seriously consider continuing this series it's not going to work if the only depth it has is within a letter that they're seen reading in the epilogue. Perhaps it'll have some depth from Birth by Sleep too, which will be good. I'm so looking forward to that game. They also need to make the game longer. In the short game time that KH has had in the past, you only skim through the worlds and particularly in Kingdom Hearts 2, they seem so superficial and unimportant in light of the bigger picture, like it's just an excuse to go and talk to cartoon characters and kill Heartless and Nobodies.

But, I digress... I do acknowledge (despite how much I have grown to dislike her) that Kairi is a very key character in Kingdom Hearts and that she and Sora are in love and I will argue this with any SoRiku fan! I am not a SoKai fan in the realm of fanfiction, but when it comes to the real thing we all have to grudingly admit that - following the fairytale formula that Disney adopts - the prince (Sora) and the princess (Kairi) fall in love. I don't believe that Sora will ever fall in love with an OC (not even my OC and if you ever read my on-going KH fic I implore you not to think that I have designed my OC as an alternative love interest for Sora). However, the relationship between Sora and Kairi seems to have been retarded in Kh2... a lot. So much that i've begun to even feel sorry for Kairi.


End file.
